5 ms·

I'm putting this[0] here just as a reminder of how horrible things can be and for basically nothing. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2026_Minab_school_attack

by karim79 7mo ago

I'm putting this[0] here just as a reminder of how horrible things can be and for basically nothing. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2026_Minab_school_attack https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2026_Minab_school_attack

acyou 7mo ago
I used to attend elementary school on a military base. I didn't feel like a human shield at the time, then again I was more naive and had less life experience than I do now.
- karim79 7mo ago
  [flagged]
  - JumpCrisscross 7mo ago
    I'm...not seeing how the comment you're responding to "blames the victims."
    - InexSquirrel 7mo ago
      Yeah I'm not following what they mean there.
    - karim79 7mo ago
      "The Shajareh Tayyebeh girls' elementary school in southern Minab was attended by both boys and girls, taught on separate floors.[9] According to locals, the school was previously a military facility.[10] Its location was near[c] the Sayyid al-Shuhada military complex which included the headquarters of the Asif Brigade of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps Navy (IRGCN).[13] As of early 2026, the school had existed as a civilian institution more than 10 years, close to but separate from the IRGCN compound."The Shajareh Tayyebeh girls' elementary school in southern Minab was attended by both boys and girls, taught on separate floors.[9] According to locals, the school was previously a military facility.[10] Its location was near[c] the Sayyid al-Shuhada military complex which included the headquarters of the Asif Brigade of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps Navy (IRGCN).[13] As of early 2026, the school had existed as a civilian institution more than 10 years, close to but separate from the IRGCN compound. For more than ten years. That's Palantir caching for you.
      - throwaway290 7mo ago
        military bases are targets. I don't know how you jump from that to victim blaming like little kids had a say in where to build a school or where to go to school or whether to shoot rockets. it's a tragedy.
        JumpCrisscross 7mo ago
        > military bases are targets Sure. But when they're next to schools, you try to avoid the school or school hours. Not doing that isn't just mean, it's strategically self defeating.
        throwaway290 7mo ago
        Yes. But you are simply agreeing with me that it's a tragedy and a US fuckup. How people get from "school next to military base = human shield" to victim blaming kids for being bombed is a mystery
- tw04 7mo ago
  You weren’t a human shield. It would have been very easy for the US and Israel to not have blown up a school, the attack was intentional. Notice they had 0 issues precisely striking the building housing Iranian leadership when this whole thing started. They didn’t “accidentally” hit the grocery store two blocks away.
  - ALittleLight 7mo ago
    For what reason would they attack a single school? Some strikes being well some doesn't mean others can't be mistaken.
    - ra 7mo ago
      Same reason they're attacking universities, medical research labs, power stations, bridges, hospitals, paramedic teams, civilian rescue teams...
      - user34283 7mo ago
        It is amazing how readily some people believe we target civilians, often based on the words of actual terrorists. With this particular incident with apparent US strikes on a school adjacent to a military complex, and formerly part of that military complex, you would think it must be obvious to any reasonable person that we did not knowingly target a school. Yet here we are.
        ra 7mo ago
        Who are these actual terrorists you speak of?
        tw04 7mo ago
        Gaza has entered the chat We are so far past there being any merit to “Israel would never knowingly target civilians/children/hospitals/etc” that you just shouldn’t even bother. Just own it, if your leadership thinks the only winning strategy is the annihilation of another people, or at least their complete displacement, own it. Stop trying to hide behind “it was a mistake” while simultaneously showing you have no issues putting a missile through a singular car window to assassinate people labeled an enemy. Nobody buys it anymore.
- trhway 7mo ago
  Today on several news media were a story that people of Iran were called by the government and formed human shields at the bridges and power plants that Trump threatened to bomb if no deal reached by the deadline. https://www.ms.now/news/iran-youths-protect-power-plants-saudi-arabia-closes-bridge-trumps-deadline https://www.ms.now/news/iran-youths-protect-power-plants-sau... Sounds like a blatant violation of all the conventions and a war crime.
  - amluto 7mo ago
    It’s hard to imagine that international law actually intends to consider civilians hanging out as “human shields” at civilian sites to be a war crime.
    - gpm 7mo ago
      No it's not. International law is generally exceptionally clear that one war crime doesn't justify another, and using civilians as human shields is about as core a war-crime as war-crimes get.
      - amluto 7mo ago
        I tried to look it up: https://ihl-databases.icrc.org/en/customary-ihl/v1/rule97#title-3 https://ihl-databases.icrc.org/en/customary-ihl/v1/rule97#ti... > The prohibition of using human shields in the Geneva Conventions, Additional Protocol I and the Statute of the International Criminal Court are couched in terms of using the presence (or movements) of civilians or other protected persons to render certain points or areas (or military forces) immune from military operations.[18] Most examples given in military manuals, or which have been the object of condemnations, have been cases where persons were actually taken to military objectives in order to shield those objectives from attacks. The military manuals of New Zealand and the United Kingdom give as examples the placing of persons in or next to ammunition trains. The situation in Iran is not this. The suggestion was that humans might volunteer to go to non-military sites. As an extreme hypothetical, are humans living in their homes acting as human shields for those homes? How about people at school? How about people parading on a bridge? Does it become different if someone threatens to blow up a bridge and people parade there in response?
noosphr 7mo ago
This is the counter argument: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2026_Iran_massacres https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2026_Iran_massacres Here's hoping the regime is destabilised enough to topple by itself.
- JumpCrisscross 7mo ago
  > This is the counter argument When the French helped us during the Revolutionary War, they didn't shore bombard the colonists' kids because it would have been bad and counterproductive.
- hrimfaxi 7mo ago
  How is this in any way a counter argument to the US bombing a school? That their own government would stoop to such lengths gives free reign to foreign governments?
  - Invictus0 7mo ago
    [flagged]
    - sho_hn 7mo ago
      > Accidents are common in war; As an engineer a substantial amount of my professional effort is spent on preventing them. They aren't acceptable.
      - annexrichmond 7mo ago
        Nobody is saying they are acceptable. But it'd be naive to say there's ever zero risk. What's your brilliant plan? Let Iran have nukes?
        cogman10 7mo ago
        > Nobody is saying they are acceptable. Saying "Accidents happen in war" is absolutely a way of saying "Accidents are acceptable in war". That's what's being said here. Otherwise, it's a useless thing to say. > What's your brilliant plan? Let Iran have nukes? There was no evidence that Iran was pursuing nukes. Certainly no evidence that they were `n days` away from getting nukes. My "brilliant" plan would have been the negotiations that were happening where Iran agreed to pretty strict monitoring and stipulations on nuclear fuel development. The "Iran was getting nukes" rhetoric needs real evidence that was actually happening not "we think that might be happening because Trump said so."
annexrichmond 7mo ago
[flagged]
- tabiv 7mo ago
  I thought Iran's nuclear capability was destroyed in the June 2025 bombings?
  - annexrichmond 7mo ago
    They were able to move and hide a lot of the enriched uranium ahead of those bombings. Not all of it was destroyed.
    - zzrrt 7mo ago
      I think that would be more believable, or at least the US/Israel would be more supportable in this, if they hadn't testily insisted on terms like "obliterated" and "set back by years" several months ago. You can only cry "nuke" so many times in a year. https://www.whitehouse.gov/releases/2025/06/irans-nuclear-facilities-have-been-obliterated-and-suggestions-otherwise-are-fake-news/ https://www.whitehouse.gov/releases/2025/06/irans-nuclear-fa...
- saltyoldman 7mo ago
  Evil dictator who killed millions of people in his lifetime is also now dead.
  - mcphage 7mo ago
    Replaced by his son.
    - tartoran 7mo ago
      >Replaced by his son. Replaced by an enraged son whose whole family had been killed in front of him. Basically Iran's Ayatolah is now younger and angrier. Thanks to Trump and Israel's Trump. Iranian people were about to topple their own regime some months ago. Now the regime is cemented again since Iran was attacked indiscriminately. Again, thank the 2 Trumps.
stickfigure 7mo ago
> for basically nothing * The people responsible for murdering ten thousand protesters are now dead. * The IRGC's military capability is significantly degraded. * Their nuclear program is likely set back even further. It's hard to get real information here but we should assume that supporting facilities were high on the target list. That's not nothing. From a strict utilitarian perspective, it's probably "worth it". Which sucks, but I haven't heard a better plan.
- 8note 7mo ago
  i dont think those are nearly as clearcut as suggested. some of the iranian side for events that resulted in a bunch of death have been killed... while also killing a bunch mkre iranians, but have the americans/israelis that armed the protestors into terrorists and incided them to violence been killed? i think theres enough police, mossad, and cia folks left to do that again and again until the protestors are all gone. similarly, its blatantly obvious for everyone that the US destoryed the iranian capabilities that dont matter. iran is still capable enough to seter both putting american ships in the strait, and boots on the ground, so that degradation is not significant. optimization without profiling. from a strict utilitarian perspective, definitely not worth it. the costs were extraordinarily expensive and havent been fully paid yet, and the profits for the US is a worse position than they started it theres some light benefits to the gulf and ukraine in that the gulf realizes that they can spend much less on defense by buying from ukraine, but that pales in comparison to the costs paid in destroyed oil infrastructure and interceptors that could have gone to ukraine
alhamduliIblis 7mo ago
[flagged]
zhoujing204 7mo ago
[flagged]
- 01HNNWZ0MV43FF 7mo ago
  People don't seem really engaged in politics. They find it a frustrating waste of time because the news doesn't bother explaining anything to them, so they don't see the results of elections. They say both sides are the same. They don't take part in local elections. A mix of taught helplessness, learned helplessness, laziness, and the fact that if you're a white guy gas prices might affect you more than foreign wars and death squads
  - greenavocado 7mo ago
    Both factions are filled with criminals that hate America (but LOVE Israel) and solely seek to exploit Americans as tax cows and organ donors. I take the third position: I'm a decline enjoyer and prepper.
    - zhoujing204 7mo ago
      Most people on Hacker News aren't ignorant, but they might be biased. You say both fractions are filled with criminals, and while parts of that might be true, it's far from the whole picture. Can you name anyone in the Democratic party who has caused as much damage as Trump? Missiles killing over 100 innocent children, inciting MAGA to storm Capitol Hill on January 6th, using presidential power to increase personal wealth by billions in one year, straining relationships with almost all democratic allies, massive layoffs in federal research institutions, and severe cuts to research funding that could damage the US research system for decades. His insane tariffs led to skyrocketing prices, economic disorder, and possibly a recession.
      - greenavocado 7mo ago
        Yes, most Democrats support illegal or virtually unlimited immigration at a rapid rate which destroys the social fabric of society and leads to a rise in criminality. They are basically the West's version of the NKVD, but instead of the state ordering them to suppress the people directly, the state just selectively allows them to get away with any crimes that have the same effect as what they wished they could order a secret police force to do directly. They learn which crimes are the approved crimes just how an AI machine learning model learns through stochastic gradient descent. They start out committing crimes basically at random, but over time they pick up on the patterns on what crimes are punished (those that are harmful to the system) and which crimes are NOT punished (beneficial to the system), and this causes them all to gravitate towards becoming system enforcers. They themselves aren't aware of their role in the system. They are just blindly following the path of least resistance the state sets up for them, but the state is aware and sets up this reward mechanism to create a system to suppress the citizens that doesn't rely on direct orders that could be traced back to them. If they were using a secret police force they would slowly lose the trust of the people and begin losing their authority. By using this stochastic citizen suppression model they are able to keep their hands cleaner. People still know they are here and that they are letting them get away with crimes. This arrangement works as long as people think this is good and nobody can make the connection between selective enforcement and an effective police state where criminals are the police. If the state was caught using secret police to, for example, suppress voters, perform blockbusting, or engage in generally demoralizing behavior they would need to explain themselves. If the state was caught using letting them in and enabling millions of them to suppress the citizenry then you need to explain yourself since you are now a racist bigot.
RiverStone 7mo ago
My wife is Iranian and I know many Iranian expats, and all my in-laws are in Iran. This attack on the school comes up all the time as a talking point. And I will tell you exactly how most Iranians react: they find it weird that you’ll talk about this school, but you won’t talk about the thousands of protesters killed by the regime. Yes. People die in war. It’s sad. But most Iranians will say “whether we go to war or not Iranians are being killed” and it’s better to fight for regime change than to just accept the status quo. Imagine being against the American Revolution because some innocent civilians will get killed? Yes, people die in war, but if there’s a chance for something better than it’s definitely worth it! Every Iranian I know thinks it’s worth it and they danced in the street when Khamenei was killed.
- anonymous_user9 7mo ago
  > Imagine being against the American Revolution because some innocent civilians will get killed? What was so great about the American revolution anyway? It's not like it gave any average people the right to vote, and it arguably preserved slavery for an extra 30 years.
- tuna74 7mo ago
  "This attack on the school comes up all the time as a talking point. And I will tell you exactly how most Iranians react: they find it weird that you’ll talk about this school, but you won’t talk about the thousands of protesters killed by the regime." The US government is not in any way responsible for the murder of protesters in Iran. That is done entirely by the government in Iran. The USA and Israel ARE responsible for the murder of the kids (and adults) in that school. If you are American or Israeli you can care about the murdered protesters, but it it not really your responsibility. The murdered kids are however.
  - RiverStone 7mo ago
    I understand what you’re saying, but I think you’re missing the point of my comment. People bring up the school as a way of discouraging American military bombing Iran. It’s a way of shaming Americans, as if we are bad, making us feel guilty for bombing. Right? What I’m trying to say is that Iranians I’ve spoken to are happy that we are bombing the regime. From their perspective, they are already being killed. The regime is dangerous to them. Bombing the regime and possibly destroying the regime is worth the risk. So don’t be so hard on yourself. Iranians want your help. People die in wars, there is always collateral damage, but sometimes war is just. Sometimes the ends do justify the means. That’s how the Iranians I’ve spoken to feel.

by karim79 7mo ago

acyou 7mo ago

I used to attend elementary school on a military base. I didn't feel like a human shield at the time, then again I was more naive and had less life experience than I do now.

karim79 7mo ago
[flagged]
- JumpCrisscross 7mo ago
  I'm...not seeing how the comment you're responding to "blames the victims."
  - InexSquirrel 7mo ago
    Yeah I'm not following what they mean there.
  - karim79 7mo ago
    "The Shajareh Tayyebeh girls' elementary school in southern Minab was attended by both boys and girls, taught on separate floors.[9] According to locals, the school was previously a military facility.[10] Its location was near[c] the Sayyid al-Shuhada military complex which included the headquarters of the Asif Brigade of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps Navy (IRGCN).[13] As of early 2026, the school had existed as a civilian institution more than 10 years, close to but separate from the IRGCN compound."The Shajareh Tayyebeh girls' elementary school in southern Minab was attended by both boys and girls, taught on separate floors.[9] According to locals, the school was previously a military facility.[10] Its location was near[c] the Sayyid al-Shuhada military complex which included the headquarters of the Asif Brigade of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps Navy (IRGCN).[13] As of early 2026, the school had existed as a civilian institution more than 10 years, close to but separate from the IRGCN compound. For more than ten years. That's Palantir caching for you.
    - throwaway290 7mo ago
      military bases are targets. I don't know how you jump from that to victim blaming like little kids had a say in where to build a school or where to go to school or whether to shoot rockets. it's a tragedy.
      - JumpCrisscross 7mo ago
        > military bases are targets Sure. But when they're next to schools, you try to avoid the school or school hours. Not doing that isn't just mean, it's strategically self defeating.
        throwaway290 7mo ago
        Yes. But you are simply agreeing with me that it's a tragedy and a US fuckup. How people get from "school next to military base = human shield" to victim blaming kids for being bombed is a mystery
tw04 7mo ago
You weren’t a human shield. It would have been very easy for the US and Israel to not have blown up a school, the attack was intentional. Notice they had 0 issues precisely striking the building housing Iranian leadership when this whole thing started. They didn’t “accidentally” hit the grocery store two blocks away.
- ALittleLight 7mo ago
  For what reason would they attack a single school? Some strikes being well some doesn't mean others can't be mistaken.
  - ra 7mo ago
    Same reason they're attacking universities, medical research labs, power stations, bridges, hospitals, paramedic teams, civilian rescue teams...
    - user34283 7mo ago
      It is amazing how readily some people believe we target civilians, often based on the words of actual terrorists. With this particular incident with apparent US strikes on a school adjacent to a military complex, and formerly part of that military complex, you would think it must be obvious to any reasonable person that we did not knowingly target a school. Yet here we are.
      - ra 7mo ago
        Who are these actual terrorists you speak of?
      - tw04 7mo ago
        Gaza has entered the chat We are so far past there being any merit to “Israel would never knowingly target civilians/children/hospitals/etc” that you just shouldn’t even bother. Just own it, if your leadership thinks the only winning strategy is the annihilation of another people, or at least their complete displacement, own it. Stop trying to hide behind “it was a mistake” while simultaneously showing you have no issues putting a missile through a singular car window to assassinate people labeled an enemy. Nobody buys it anymore.
trhway 7mo ago
Today on several news media were a story that people of Iran were called by the government and formed human shields at the bridges and power plants that Trump threatened to bomb if no deal reached by the deadline. https://www.ms.now/news/iran-youths-protect-power-plants-saudi-arabia-closes-bridge-trumps-deadline https://www.ms.now/news/iran-youths-protect-power-plants-sau... Sounds like a blatant violation of all the conventions and a war crime.
- amluto 7mo ago
  It’s hard to imagine that international law actually intends to consider civilians hanging out as “human shields” at civilian sites to be a war crime.
  - gpm 7mo ago
    No it's not. International law is generally exceptionally clear that one war crime doesn't justify another, and using civilians as human shields is about as core a war-crime as war-crimes get.
    - amluto 7mo ago
      I tried to look it up: https://ihl-databases.icrc.org/en/customary-ihl/v1/rule97#title-3 https://ihl-databases.icrc.org/en/customary-ihl/v1/rule97#ti... > The prohibition of using human shields in the Geneva Conventions, Additional Protocol I and the Statute of the International Criminal Court are couched in terms of using the presence (or movements) of civilians or other protected persons to render certain points or areas (or military forces) immune from military operations.[18] Most examples given in military manuals, or which have been the object of condemnations, have been cases where persons were actually taken to military objectives in order to shield those objectives from attacks. The military manuals of New Zealand and the United Kingdom give as examples the placing of persons in or next to ammunition trains. The situation in Iran is not this. The suggestion was that humans might volunteer to go to non-military sites. As an extreme hypothetical, are humans living in their homes acting as human shields for those homes? How about people at school? How about people parading on a bridge? Does it become different if someone threatens to blow up a bridge and people parade there in response?

noosphr 7mo ago

This is the counter argument: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2026_Iran_massacres https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2026_Iran_massacres Here's hoping the regime is destabilised enough to topple by itself.

JumpCrisscross 7mo ago
> This is the counter argument When the French helped us during the Revolutionary War, they didn't shore bombard the colonists' kids because it would have been bad and counterproductive.
hrimfaxi 7mo ago
How is this in any way a counter argument to the US bombing a school? That their own government would stoop to such lengths gives free reign to foreign governments?
- Invictus0 7mo ago
  [flagged]
  - sho_hn 7mo ago
    > Accidents are common in war; As an engineer a substantial amount of my professional effort is spent on preventing them. They aren't acceptable.
    - annexrichmond 7mo ago
      Nobody is saying they are acceptable. But it'd be naive to say there's ever zero risk. What's your brilliant plan? Let Iran have nukes?
      - cogman10 7mo ago
        > Nobody is saying they are acceptable. Saying "Accidents happen in war" is absolutely a way of saying "Accidents are acceptable in war". That's what's being said here. Otherwise, it's a useless thing to say. > What's your brilliant plan? Let Iran have nukes? There was no evidence that Iran was pursuing nukes. Certainly no evidence that they were `n days` away from getting nukes. My "brilliant" plan would have been the negotiations that were happening where Iran agreed to pretty strict monitoring and stipulations on nuclear fuel development. The "Iran was getting nukes" rhetoric needs real evidence that was actually happening not "we think that might be happening because Trump said so."

annexrichmond 7mo ago

[flagged]

tabiv 7mo ago
I thought Iran's nuclear capability was destroyed in the June 2025 bombings?
- annexrichmond 7mo ago
  They were able to move and hide a lot of the enriched uranium ahead of those bombings. Not all of it was destroyed.
  - zzrrt 7mo ago
    I think that would be more believable, or at least the US/Israel would be more supportable in this, if they hadn't testily insisted on terms like "obliterated" and "set back by years" several months ago. You can only cry "nuke" so many times in a year. https://www.whitehouse.gov/releases/2025/06/irans-nuclear-facilities-have-been-obliterated-and-suggestions-otherwise-are-fake-news/ https://www.whitehouse.gov/releases/2025/06/irans-nuclear-fa...
saltyoldman 7mo ago
Evil dictator who killed millions of people in his lifetime is also now dead.
- mcphage 7mo ago
  Replaced by his son.
  - tartoran 7mo ago
    >Replaced by his son. Replaced by an enraged son whose whole family had been killed in front of him. Basically Iran's Ayatolah is now younger and angrier. Thanks to Trump and Israel's Trump. Iranian people were about to topple their own regime some months ago. Now the regime is cemented again since Iran was attacked indiscriminately. Again, thank the 2 Trumps.

stickfigure 7mo ago

> for basically nothing * The people responsible for murdering ten thousand protesters are now dead. * The IRGC's military capability is significantly degraded. * Their nuclear program is likely set back even further. It's hard to get real information here but we should assume that supporting facilities were high on the target list. That's not nothing. From a strict utilitarian perspective, it's probably "worth it". Which sucks, but I haven't heard a better plan.

8note 7mo ago
i dont think those are nearly as clearcut as suggested. some of the iranian side for events that resulted in a bunch of death have been killed... while also killing a bunch mkre iranians, but have the americans/israelis that armed the protestors into terrorists and incided them to violence been killed? i think theres enough police, mossad, and cia folks left to do that again and again until the protestors are all gone. similarly, its blatantly obvious for everyone that the US destoryed the iranian capabilities that dont matter. iran is still capable enough to seter both putting american ships in the strait, and boots on the ground, so that degradation is not significant. optimization without profiling. from a strict utilitarian perspective, definitely not worth it. the costs were extraordinarily expensive and havent been fully paid yet, and the profits for the US is a worse position than they started it theres some light benefits to the gulf and ukraine in that the gulf realizes that they can spend much less on defense by buying from ukraine, but that pales in comparison to the costs paid in destroyed oil infrastructure and interceptors that could have gone to ukraine

alhamduliIblis 7mo ago

[flagged]

zhoujing204 7mo ago

[flagged]

01HNNWZ0MV43FF 7mo ago
People don't seem really engaged in politics. They find it a frustrating waste of time because the news doesn't bother explaining anything to them, so they don't see the results of elections. They say both sides are the same. They don't take part in local elections. A mix of taught helplessness, learned helplessness, laziness, and the fact that if you're a white guy gas prices might affect you more than foreign wars and death squads
- greenavocado 7mo ago
  Both factions are filled with criminals that hate America (but LOVE Israel) and solely seek to exploit Americans as tax cows and organ donors. I take the third position: I'm a decline enjoyer and prepper.
  - zhoujing204 7mo ago
    Most people on Hacker News aren't ignorant, but they might be biased. You say both fractions are filled with criminals, and while parts of that might be true, it's far from the whole picture. Can you name anyone in the Democratic party who has caused as much damage as Trump? Missiles killing over 100 innocent children, inciting MAGA to storm Capitol Hill on January 6th, using presidential power to increase personal wealth by billions in one year, straining relationships with almost all democratic allies, massive layoffs in federal research institutions, and severe cuts to research funding that could damage the US research system for decades. His insane tariffs led to skyrocketing prices, economic disorder, and possibly a recession.
    - greenavocado 7mo ago
      Yes, most Democrats support illegal or virtually unlimited immigration at a rapid rate which destroys the social fabric of society and leads to a rise in criminality. They are basically the West's version of the NKVD, but instead of the state ordering them to suppress the people directly, the state just selectively allows them to get away with any crimes that have the same effect as what they wished they could order a secret police force to do directly. They learn which crimes are the approved crimes just how an AI machine learning model learns through stochastic gradient descent. They start out committing crimes basically at random, but over time they pick up on the patterns on what crimes are punished (those that are harmful to the system) and which crimes are NOT punished (beneficial to the system), and this causes them all to gravitate towards becoming system enforcers. They themselves aren't aware of their role in the system. They are just blindly following the path of least resistance the state sets up for them, but the state is aware and sets up this reward mechanism to create a system to suppress the citizens that doesn't rely on direct orders that could be traced back to them. If they were using a secret police force they would slowly lose the trust of the people and begin losing their authority. By using this stochastic citizen suppression model they are able to keep their hands cleaner. People still know they are here and that they are letting them get away with crimes. This arrangement works as long as people think this is good and nobody can make the connection between selective enforcement and an effective police state where criminals are the police. If the state was caught using secret police to, for example, suppress voters, perform blockbusting, or engage in generally demoralizing behavior they would need to explain themselves. If the state was caught using letting them in and enabling millions of them to suppress the citizenry then you need to explain yourself since you are now a racist bigot.

RiverStone 7mo ago

My wife is Iranian and I know many Iranian expats, and all my in-laws are in Iran. This attack on the school comes up all the time as a talking point. And I will tell you exactly how most Iranians react: they find it weird that you’ll talk about this school, but you won’t talk about the thousands of protesters killed by the regime. Yes. People die in war. It’s sad. But most Iranians will say “whether we go to war or not Iranians are being killed” and it’s better to fight for regime change than to just accept the status quo. Imagine being against the American Revolution because some innocent civilians will get killed? Yes, people die in war, but if there’s a chance for something better than it’s definitely worth it! Every Iranian I know thinks it’s worth it and they danced in the street when Khamenei was killed.

anonymous_user9 7mo ago
> Imagine being against the American Revolution because some innocent civilians will get killed? What was so great about the American revolution anyway? It's not like it gave any average people the right to vote, and it arguably preserved slavery for an extra 30 years.
tuna74 7mo ago
"This attack on the school comes up all the time as a talking point. And I will tell you exactly how most Iranians react: they find it weird that you’ll talk about this school, but you won’t talk about the thousands of protesters killed by the regime." The US government is not in any way responsible for the murder of protesters in Iran. That is done entirely by the government in Iran. The USA and Israel ARE responsible for the murder of the kids (and adults) in that school. If you are American or Israeli you can care about the murdered protesters, but it it not really your responsibility. The murdered kids are however.
- RiverStone 7mo ago
  I understand what you’re saying, but I think you’re missing the point of my comment. People bring up the school as a way of discouraging American military bombing Iran. It’s a way of shaming Americans, as if we are bad, making us feel guilty for bombing. Right? What I’m trying to say is that Iranians I’ve spoken to are happy that we are bombing the regime. From their perspective, they are already being killed. The regime is dangerous to them. Bombing the regime and possibly destroying the regime is worth the risk. So don’t be so hard on yourself. Iranians want your help. People die in wars, there is always collateral damage, but sometimes war is just. Sometimes the ends do justify the means. That’s how the Iranians I’ve spoken to feel.